Theres similarities, but only one month in my 2011 Autumn forecast had such a pattern, not the entire autumn, though autumn and the winter did bear much more warmer then my forecast as well as that of others.

The differences are the Jet Stream will be somewhat farther north, and the core of the heat will be a bit more north as well, while storm areas remain between the battle zones of the cooler air in the northeast and the hotter air of the plains, as this is generally a typical pattern for storms cross the country this time of year.

So in summary, this summer will be similar to 2011, but the southeast will be wetter and the drought will shift west and north some, along with the worst of the heat, and the northeast will be a bit cooler then last year, but will still average at or slightly below normal.

Theres similarities, but only one month in my 2011 Autumn forecast had such a pattern, not the entire autumn, though autumn and the winter did bear much more warmer then my forecast as well as that of others.

The differences are the Jet Stream will be somewhat farther north, and the core of the heat will be a bit more north as well, while storm areas remain between the battle zones of the cooler air in the northeast and the hotter air of the plains, as this is generally a typical pattern for storms cross the country this time of year.

So in summary, this summer will be similar to 2011, but the southeast will be wetter and the drought will shift west and north some, along with the worst of the heat, and the northeast will be a bit cooler then last year, but will still average at or slightly below normal.

The north east could do well with a cooler summer, I might be a weather noob when it comes to the long range, but the trough that you speak of "hanging around" could also bring rain? Would be great to ward off the drought.

The two actually look amazingly similar to each other. It had been so incredibly warm just about anywhere in the US lately that I don't see anywhere I could rule out a hot summer. Yet these aren't the only venues that don't support the spread of heat through the whole country this coming season. Even the Global Prediction Center which was pretty bullish in March and April cooled some in its May update. TCC Japan just updated today also and isn't all that hot either, especially Northeast/eastern Midwest. Yet not everyone is sold on a milder summer - Steve D from nynjpa has been pretty bullish with heat in his summer forecast (per his Long Range thoughts). He thinks the unprecedented warmth in the US as of late is because of the record cold stratosphere (I actually wish I knew where I could get a historical chart of stratospheric temps to get a good look at this). But his argument is a cold stratospheric creates a feedback in enhancing 500mb heights, leading to stronger ridges and weaker/more transient dips in the jet stream. We'll see what happens.

The two actually look amazingly similar to each other. It had been so incredibly warm just about anywhere in the US lately that I don't see anywhere I could rule out a hot summer. Yet these aren't the only venues that don't support the spread of heat through the whole country this coming season. Even the Global Prediction Center which was pretty bullish in March and April cooled some in its May update. TCC Japan just updated today also and isn't all that hot either, especially Northeast/eastern Midwest. Yet not everyone is sold on a milder summer - Steve D from nynjpa has been pretty bullish with heat in his summer forecast (per his Long Range thoughts). He thinks the unprecedented warmth in the US as of late is because of the record cold stratosphere (I actually wish I knew where I could get a historical chart of stratospheric temps to get a good look at this). But his argument is a cold stratospheric creates a feedback in enhancing 500mb heights, leading to stronger ridges and weaker/more transient dips in the jet stream. We'll see what happens.

Hard to tell what happens regarding the summer, but at least for the Mid Atlantic and NE regions at this time I'm questioning a hot summer idea. After all, there was still a record cold stratosphere this winter, yet now that it's spring the pattern still isn't colder than average but at least in the NE parts of the US, there's been almost no warmth extremes since March, with plenty of warmth extremes relative to average prior to March. There's definitely going to be heat at times in the summer, but until I see the current pattern change, most of these heat surges will likely have trouble settling down over the East and creating a very warm pattern.

I hope he's wrong myself, too. It's pretty clear by al' the outlooks that the country as a whole need be bracing for another toasty summer. But if the (North)east and possibly Mid-Atlantic and maybe back into the eastern Midwest can evade the worst that would be refreshing

While the last two summer have moderated off some come August in the East Coast region, those areas (at least roughly NYC on south) took on some of the most anomalous heat in June and July both years (especially in 2010 and excluding the extreme Southern Plains scorcher last year).

The CWG in Washington DC is calling for another hotter-than-normal summer there but its forecast is shy of what occurred in 2010 and 2011. Of course it seriously underestimated how hot both 2010 and 2011 would be. This is effectively the third straight summer it's forecast temperatures 1 or 2 degrees above normal there but in actuality the last two were much hotter for DC than that. I just hope that if it's on to something, at least it isn't underestimating again this time.

And the other silver lining there is that every analog year it mentions went on to later produce at least two colder-than-average months in the November-January period that followed. But that of course is far too long term for this thread, given that is basically winter.

Back to the summer I just hope the idea of somewhat more tempered heat in the East (with the ore sustained heat holding back west a bit) comes to pass.

Roger Smith (who nailed the mild December and January failing only in February) has put out a SCARY HOTsummer outlook.

Still it's the only one I can see that's this extreme. There's plenty other support (from both this site and a search I did for other off-site forecasts) for a warm summer in much of the country, but nothing else as extreme as this inferno. I just hope the more moderate ideas on here prove right this time!

That's the first time I've seen any outlook map recognize our summer dry season ("Dry Season Masking"). It's nice to see that.

Anyway, summers here are pretty hard to predict (temperature-wise) as we have so many microclimates and the ENSO doesn't seem to have any affect on our summer weather. However - the last two summers in Southern California were two of the coolest in the last 30 years, along with 1999 and 2001. Not sure if we'll get another one of those this year.

He thinks the unprecedented warmth in the US as of late is because of the record cold stratosphere (I actually wish I knew where I could get a historical chart of stratospheric temps to get a good look at this). But his argument is a cold stratospheric creates a feedback in enhancing 500mb heights, leading to stronger ridges and weaker/more transient dips in the jet stream. We'll see what happens.

Look here. I'm sure we'll be revisiting the charts below later this year.

Really the only real wildcard I'm seeing is the Northeastern quadrant of the US - in how much (if any) more moderate it will be compared to south/west of there. Isotherm is going a little above normal and blizzardOf96 a little cooler. But both outlooks have it wet/stormy in the east, and very hot and dry much of the Plains.

My personal thoughts are that if ENSO remains in the neutral category (at least in most ENSO regions) that'll help build the heat to the west, not sure to what extent it would plow east based on ENSO alone, but if the NAO is negative the two together could form a bit of a heat roadblock in the Northeast and more conditionally parts of the GLs which would also give the possible set-ups for wet/severe weather.